'Superb' - Tim Harford, author of How to Make the World Add Up Money is essential to the economy and how we live our lives, yet is inherently worthless. We can use it to build a home or send us to space, and it can lead to the rise and fall of empires. Few innovations have had such a huge impact on the development of humanity, but money is a shared fiction; a story we believe in so long as others act as if it is true.Money is rarely out of the headlines – from the invention of cryptocurrencies to the problem of high inflation, extraordinary interventions by central banks and the power the West has over the worldwide banking system. In Money in One Lesson, Gavin Jackson answers the most important questions on what money is and how it shapes our world, drawing on vivid examples from throughout history to demystify and show how societies and its citizens, both past and present, are always entwined with matters of money.‘A highly illuminating, well-researched and beautifully written book on one of humanity’s most important innovations’ – Martin Wolf, chief economics commentator, Financial Times

Delightful and deep, Money in One Lesson is a superb account of the strange connections between money and economics, This is a highly illuminating, well-researched and beautifully written book on one of humanity’s most important innovations. People both love and hate money. But mostly, they fail to understand it. Such ignorance is not bliss. Happily, this book will go far to cure it, A lucid exposition of a widely misunderstood topic, liberally illustrated with nuggets of intriguing information, Gavin Jackson has written that rarest of things: an intellectually rigorous and informative book on a technical subject that is also a pleasure to read. Anecdotes, stories and history bring money to life, A lucid and at times very funny history of money

Gavin Jackson is an Economics correspondent at The Economist, writing about climate change and specializing in economics, business and public policy. He is an emerging voice on the economy and has appeared on BBC Radio and Television. Money in One Lesson is his first book.